To create the FragBox 2 (Core i7), Falcon Northwest took everything good in its Mach V monster gaming system and jammed it into the smaller FragBox case.

Falcon Northwest's new FragBox 2 (Core i7) ($8,895 direct) ramps up the insanity on both pricing and gaming performance. When the folks at Falcon NW asked me how I wanted them to equip its latest FragBox, I told them to wow me. Wow me they did, with a top-of-the-line Core i7 quad-core processor, two Nvidia GeForce GTX 285 graphics cards, and an insane 1 terabyte of solid-state storage distributed among four solid-state drives (SSDs). Now you might think it's crazy to talk about an $8,900 PC in today's economy when perfectly usable gaming systems start at around $1,100, but you have to remember that Rolls-Royce, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Tiffany & Co. were able to sell their luxury items successfully during the Great Depression. Yes, you can configure a Core i7-powered FragBox 2 with decent gaming performance for about $2,000, but I wanted a system with ultimate bragability. Read on to see how well this FragBox fills the bill.

The FragBox 2 is built in the same case design we've seen since all the way back in 2004, though this time there are no windows on the sides to see through. The exterior is painted white with a blue double racing stripe over the center and top. The checkered flag on the side of the case is unsubtle but fits the overall design theme. If you open the case, there's enough room to view the high-end components like the four 2.5-inch SSDs and the two graphics cards. This, despite the fact that the case itself is jam-packed, with no expansion space for any additional internal components. The engineers at Falcon took the time to make sure that all the internal wiring was shortened and routed to help with internal airflow. The system is totally air-cooled. On the one hand, this means that there's a bit of fan noise while the system is operating. On the other, Falcon didn't need to use liquid cooling and reduced the complexity of the system, leading to potentially greater reliability in the long run.

A top-of-the-line Intel Core i7-965 Extreme Edition processor is the core (pun intended) of this particular gaming box. Unlike other high-end gaming rigs, the FragBox 2 runs at a stock 3.2-GHz clock speed. While you'd think this would put it at a disadvantage compared with overclocked rivals, the system performed very well indeed, as we'll see below. The system has two Nvidia GeForce GTX 285 graphics cards crammed in there in an SLI configuration, which is a first for such a compact PC. (Previous FragBoxes, like the QX9650, had only one graphics card.) The FragBox 2's 12GB of system memory means that the system must be running Windows Vista Premium 64-bit (32-bit Vista supports only up to 4GB), and 12GB should be more than enough for any current gaming fan, ensuring that you'll be set for the next several generations of games. There's no crapware mucking up the system, which is as it should be on any box but especially a gaming one.

This FragBox came with 1TB of hard drive space. That sounds normal until you find out how that was achieved: four 256GB Samsung SSDs setup in a RAID 0 array. This basically aggregates the drives so that they look like one large 1TB drive to the system. Yes, you can save a whopping $4,000 (!) by dropping the custom paint (itself around $800) and replacing the four SSDs with a single 1TB spinning hard drive, but I was going for the most insanely bragable system. Now, it has to be said that no one in their right mind would spend this kind of money for "only" 1TB of hard drive space when a regular spinning 1TB hard drive can be had for less than $100. One thing's for certain, though: The four SSD drives load Vista, games, and other apps faster than any spinning hard drive. In fact, this is one of the fastest-loading desktops I've ever tested. I'm also sure the SSDs helped the system gain its speedy Photoshop and Windows Media Encoder test results, since both of these tests use the hard drives while processing their multimedia files. The FragBox 2 is the first system I've seen with this many SSD drives. Four drives is overkill, since I'd expect similar performance from a system with two SSDs in a RAID 0 array and a spinning hard drive for data. Still, I applaud the folks at Falcon Northwest for doing what they did "because they can."

Gaming boxes represent one of the few remaining areas in the PC industry where performance really matters. For example, your iPod will sync music and videos at roughly the same rate whether you're hooked up to a $400 budget box or a $10,000 gold-plated über-PC, so day-to-day tasks aren't the focus of this system. Smooth game play is the FragBox 2's reason for being. The system's high-powered Core i7, 12GB of memory, four SSDs, and twin graphics cards all helped the PC gain very high scores on all our benchmark tests. This is fitting, because you'd look like a fool if you tried to brag about an insanely expensive system that doesn't perform.

The FragBox 2 played three of the four test games smoothly without breaking a sweat: Crysis at 92 frames per second (1,280-by-1,024 resolution), World in Conflict (WiC) at 133 fps (1,280-by-1,024) and at 82 fps (1,920-by-1,200). The last game test, Crysis at 1,920-by-1,200, is "playable" at 33 fps but needs to be scaled down a tad to be smoother for more discerning gamers. Contrast this with the Maingear Ephex (Core i7), which was able to play all four test games smoothly due to a triple-SLI setup with Nvidia GeForce GTX 280 cards. The GTX 285 cards in the FragBox 2 are newer and faster, but the extra GPU helped the Maingear pass the toughest Crysis test. That said, aside from that one test, you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference in game play between the two, and the Maingear is nowhere near as portable. The other Core i7 behemoth I tested recently is the AVADirect Uberous X58 Gaming System, and the FragBox 2 certainly bests that system on the game grid.

Gaming prowess aside, this FragBox (as usual) is a monster multimedia powerhouse. It was able to complete the Windows Media Encoder test in only 28 seconds (second fastest ever after the Maingear's 26 seconds). The FragBox 2 also completed the Photoshop CS4 test in 1 minute 2 seconds, again second to the Maingear (51 seconds). The Core i7-965, 12GB of RAM, and speedy SSDs all helped the FragBox 2 achieve this level of performance. Last but not least, the FragBox 2 also finished second behind the Maingear on Futuremark's PCMark Vantage test, which measures how fast a PC is at day-to-day tasks. Granted, no one buys a system like this to work with spreadsheets or Word documents, but it's nice to know it can zoom through them nonetheless.

The FragBox 2 comes with a three-year parts-and-labor standard warranty, and Falcon Northwest has personalized service, so you can customize the FragBox 2 to your hearts' content. Since the system is already so packed with stuff, I'd recommend you contact Falcon NW for future upgrades. They take care of rerouting the cables and replacing components, which would be a messy job if you tried it yourself. Besides, if you can afford an $8,900 system, you can afford the upgrade service down the road.

So why would I buy a FragBox instead of the similarly impressive AVADirect Uberous X58 SLI/CrossFire Gaming System or the Maingear Ephex? For one thing, you can carry it places. The Uberous and the Ephex are leviathan systems that you install in one place, and then you need to bring your friends to your room or apartment so you can impress them with your huge tower PC. The FragBox 2 can be easily strapped to a scooter or put in the seat next to you in your car, so you can bring it to a LAN party or your friend's house for a gaming session. The fact that it's competitive with the highest-end gaming rigs, has $4,000 of paint and SSDs, and looks so cool all add to the bragability factor. At this price, you can have it match your sports car's paint job as well (shaggin' wagon-style airbrushed art of wizards or nymphs can be a lot more expensivecheck falcon-nw.com for examples). The HP Firebird with VoodooDNA 803 is certainly attractive, with a much cheaper price tag and some portability, but it's simply not in the same performance league as the FragBox 2.

If there's any downside to the Falcon Northwest FragBox 2 (Core i7), it's that it doesn't quite hit the fastest gaming PC target that the Ephex still owns. Oh, and there's the almost $9,000 price tag, but that's to be expected for such an outrageous piece of machinery. As I said, you can get the $2,000 "reasonable" version of the FragBox, or the $4,845 (still rather insanely fast) version without the SSDs and paint. But as for you certifiable individuals prepared to fork over the spare change to get the ultimate in portable gaming systems you can boast about to your friends: I salute you.

Joel Santo Domingo is the Lead Analyst for the Desktops team at PC Magazine Labs. He joined PC Magazine in 2000, after 7 years of IT work for companies large and small. His background includes managing mobile, desktop and network infrastructure on both the Macintosh and Windows platforms. Joel is proof that you can escape the retail grind: he wore a yellow polo shirt early in his tech career. Along the way Joel earned a BA in English Literature and an MBA in Information Technology...
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